


Pretty good team

by linndechir



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Gen, father-son bonding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-29
Updated: 2013-07-29
Packaged: 2017-12-21 16:54:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,591
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/902650
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/linndechir/pseuds/linndechir
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The story of how Chuck started marking their kills on their fighting suits.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pretty good team

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [this prompt](http://pacificrimkink.livejournal.com/350.html?thread=989790#t989790) on the Pacific Rim kinkmeme.

Chuck had disappeared after their debriefing and after basking in the applause of the crew and the admiring questions of journalists for a while, and Herc only had the time to look for him again several hours later. He had no idea what he was going to say to him, but even so he felt that it would be irresponsible not to check in on the boy. The first fight against a kaiju was tough for anyone, especially for a fifteen-year-old kid.

He found the boy in one of the equipment storage rooms – not such an unlikely place to be for him; Chuck had already been obsessive about their equipment being in order before the mission, so it stood to reason that he was the same afterwards. He was sitting at a large workbench, both their armours laid out in front of him next to a few cans of paint, and he was scribbling on a piece of paper.

“What are you doing?” Herc asked, almost flinching at the sound of his own voice. It had come across more like a reproach than a neutral question, and Herc wondered if he'd ever manage to find the right tone with his son. But for once Chuck was in too good a mood to mind much, he had been glowing with pride since they had taken down the kaiju earlier today. Chuck's first kaiju. 

With a big grin on his face Chuck held up the piece of paper he had been writing, no, drawing on. Herc stepped closer to examine it, frowned a little. Chuck had never had much of an artistic talent.

“What do you think? I like this one best.” Chuck pointed at one of the scribbles. Herc squinted. It reminded him vaguely of the Starfleet insignia, but to his knowledge Chuck hadn't cared much for TV or movies since he had been a little boy.

“What's it supposed to be?” He thought back of the crude drawings Chuck had made as a little kid, and at fifteen Chuck gave him the same look he had given his father at five, as if he thought Herc had to be a complete idiot not to get it.

“It's a kaiju head.” He paused, waiting for Herc to catch on. When Herc just kept looking at him, Chuck sighed and explained, “To mark our kills. We should paint them on the armour.”

Chuck's face fell a little when Herc's reaction wasn't as enthusiastic as he seemed to have hoped – his reaction was actually non-existent, because Herc was simply dumbfounded. Chuck had been incredibly professional since they had started working together, far too tense and mature for a boy his age, obsessed with being taken seriously by his father and his superiors and the whole crew, and this almost child-like enthusiasm had taken Herc by surprise.

“It's an old military tradition, right?” Chuck's voice sounded a bit more hesitant now. He put the piece of paper back onto the workbench, smoothed it out carefully. “You told me about it when I was a kid. How warriors used to get tattoos or carve notches into their weapons, one for every enemy they killed. And you said some figher pilots marked on the hull how many enemy planes they had shot down.”

_You don't remember, do you?_

The disappointment in Chuck's eyes hit Herc like a punch in the face. He did remember that tradition of course, but he couldn't remember ever telling Chuck about it, and he certainly had no idea that it had impressed his son that much. To be frank, he had always thought it was rather immature and old-fashioned, to show off with something that was simply an unfortunate necessity.

But for once he had the good sense not to say the first thing that came to his mind. Maybe, after years of always saying the wrong thing to his son, he was finally learning. He sat down next to Chuck, closer to him than he would have just a few weeks ago.

“We've only killed one kaiju so far, you and me.” 

That brought a tentative smile back onto Chuck's face, his eyes gleaming with pride. He looked so young in that moment, younger even than fifteen. If everything was still right in the world, Chuck would be proud of winning a rugby match with his high school team right now, not of killing a gigantic monster that would have destroyed millions of lives otherwise. Herc knew it was his fault that Chuck was in this situation, that Chuck was even here even though he was far, far too young for any of this. But his son was also the most promising young pilot the Jaeger Academy had ever produced, and the world couldn't afford not to use him just because his father would have liked to protect him. And if drawing little kaiju heads on his armour made the boy feel better about this crazy life he was living – crazy and probably so very short, because Herc Hansen knew better than anyone that even the best Jaeger pilots didn't live very long – the least Herc could do was to let him have that small pleasure.

“The first of many, right?” Chuck looked hopeful, then glanced down at their matching suits on the workbench. There was a sudden note of fear in his voice, fear of rejection, fear of having to be alone again, and Herc realised only then that his son sounded like that far too often. “I mean, we beat the shit out of that kaiju. The bastard didn't even get anywhere near the coast.”

_He's afraid I won't want to co-pilot with him again, even though he did better than most pilots in their first fight._

“Yeah, we made a pretty good team out there,” he said, and what he meant was that Chuck had done well, that Herc was proud of him, but the boy was already convinced that he was the saviour of the universe and the greatest Jaeger pilot the world would ever see without Herc stroking his ego. And what he had said was enough, wasn't it? Because Chuck was smiling again, smiling like a little kid on his birthday, except that he hadn't looked like that on his birthday for years, and the last time Herc had tried to give him a birthday gift Chuck had told him that one shitty present a year didn't make up for never being there the rest of the time.

Chuck shifted a little on the bench, fidgetting with the piece of paper.

“If you don't like this one, we can use a different design,” he said, and Herc smiled because coming from Chuck that was the biggest peace offering he had ever heard.

“Nah, I like it. Reminds me of the Starfleet symbol,” he replied, laughed when Chuck rolled his eyes in that particularly annoyed way of teenagers who were embarrassed by their parents.

“Star Trek hasn't been cool since before I was born, old man,” but for all the adolescent brattiness in his voice he was still smiling, and leaning a little towards Herc. For the first time in what felt like years Herc considered hugging his son, or just slinging an arm around his shoulders, but it had been too long for that to feel natural, and he doubted any attempt at touching Chuck would even be welcome. Instead he tapped on the little drawing of a kaiju head.

“Go with the one you like best. On both our armours, all right?” Herc got up, relieved that Chuck seemed to be dealing well with his first real battle, and in desperate need of some sleep. He felt bone-tired, exhausted from the fight and the added stress of drifting with his son, of trying to play down just how worried he was about him because Chuck would have assumed that his father wasn't taking him seriously, not that he wanted to protect him.

“All right. Thanks, dad.”

Herc froze, and so did Chuck, his smile lingering on his face for a second as if he had forgotten to stop smiling before he swallowed hard, and for a moment they just stared at each other in disbelief. Because Chuck didn't call Herc 'dad', hadn't called him that since Herc had told him about his mother's death. Neither of them said anything to fill the silence that ensued, and Herc decided the only thing worse than ignoring what his son had just said would be to acknowledge it. He cleared his throat and scratched the back of his neck.

“Er, don't go to bed too late,” he said and quickly retreated towards the door.

“I killed a kaiju today, I'm not a child anymore!” Chuck called after him, and Herc had a feeling he was going to hear that particular sentence awfully often from now on. But he decided to let it go for tonight, even grinned back at Chuck over his shoulder before he left the room. If he allowed his son to put that sort of burden on his young shoulders, he had to let him deal with it his own way. And no matter what he thought about showing off their kill count on their armours as if they were some sort of viking warriors, he was too grateful to have even such a little thing to connect him with his son, something that belonged only to them, something that brought them closer even outside the drift. Herc wasn't going to waste that chance.


End file.
